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The External Control of Auditory Hallucinations: An Information Theory Analysis
Author(s) -
SLADE P. D.
Publication year - 1974
Publication title -
british journal of social and clinical psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.479
H-Index - 92
eISSN - 2044-8260
pISSN - 0007-1293
DOI - 10.1111/j.2044-8260.1974.tb00880.x
Subject(s) - hallucinating , psychology , audiology , cognitive psychology , control (management) , reading (process) , information processing , computer science , artificial intelligence , medicine , political science , law
The aim of the present study was to explore the effects of external stimulation on the reported occurrence of auditory hallucinations. The activity variable was selected for study as it is readily amenable to operational definition and systematic manipulation using Shannon's information theory equations. Two auditorily hallucinated patients were asked to report the occurrence/non‐occurrence of their ‘voices’ during 20 s time periods. During each period one of six conditions was implemented: a no‐activity control condition; three information‐processing conditions involving increasing information load; a reading and writing condition. The main finding was that the frequency of auditory hallucinations decreased as a function of increasing information to be processed. A ‘limited channel capacity’ model is proposed to account for the findings, which are discussed both in relation to the experimental literature and to their potential clinical implications.